The cloud is changing the nature of work – Aaron Levie from Box (video)

The nature of work is being profoundly changed by the cloud and software delivered as a service, the CEO of Box Aaron Levie told Siliconrepublic.com today at the Dublin Web Summit.

Levie said Box now counts more than 20m workers in 180,000 businesses worldwide as customers.

In the middle of last year, Box raised US$125m from General Atlantic and the company is believed to be valued at US$1.5bn.

Box Inc’s platform allows companies to store and share files securely in the cloud. Speaking with Siliconrepublic.com, Levie said the company is working closely with established software giants, like Microsoft and Salesforce.com, to better integrate with their business applications.

“If you are in Salesforce.com you can pull any customer record or if you are in a Netsuite ERP system, the vision is that you can store it once and extend anywhere.”

The new workstyle

Levie said cloud and the delivery of software as a service is transforming the nature of work as we know it.

“We are seeing this in the changing nature of the types of customers we are beginning to work with – larger and larger enterprises. The world’s biggest companies need a secure way to manage information in the cloud. For example, a pharmaceutical company that needs to more securely collaborate on drugs they are working on, or you could be a media and entertainment company that needs to more efficiently collaborate on a movie or a new record – these are the new types and ways of the cloud.

“Software delivered as a service will change the way we work, make us more productive, and move efficiently through businesses and industries,” Levie said.